#notimeforemotion

Kuebiko: A state of exhaustion inspired by acts of senseless violence.

It’s been months of rebuilding, months of doggedly ignoring the way their table sits mostly empty, the way they’ve had to quietly deliver loss and grief onto the doorsteps of families. 

Sometimes, he finds himself staring, attention drawn to the scar where Harry’s eye should be, to the prosthetics that Merlin’s still adapting to. It’s rude at best, offensive at worst, and Eggsy’s apologized more than once. But it claws at him, a vicious reminder of the violence they’ve endured. Eggsy feels worse, feels guilty and stupid, as if their injuries are something he’s meant to feel. It’s not right of him, and he paces at night, dwelling on his own selfishness.

There aren’t missions, initially, most of them deferred to other agencies while they continue to recover. It takes perhaps less time than it should have, but they’re all some form of desperate. Eggsy ends his own forced imprisonment by volunteering for the first of the field work.

Merlin is calm, collected, accounting for nearly every step he makes even before he’s made it. 

“Galahad,” the warning comes carefully, an edge to Merlin’s voice that Eggsy can’t immediately identify. It sets him on edge, even though everything seems clear. It’s only a second before he realizes, but it’s a second too late, someone rushing him from behind. His head’s driven into the wall, arm wrenched behind his back before he drives his heel back and against their instep.

It drives enough of a wedge between them that Eggsy can turn around, only to be clocked in the face. He tucks in closer, jabbing sharply against their ribs and feeling satisfaction when he hears the loud crack that follows. They return the favor by breaking his arm, palm driving so forcefully into his forearm that he yells before he can even think not to.

The fight drags on, though it’s only a few minutes, it feels like hours. Time collapses the moment he manages to kill them, arm wrapped tight around their throat, clinging while they thrash.

Only a few hours and he’s home, arm set and cast. He’s given a few hours of rest before Merlin comes seeking him out.

“Here for debrief?” he asks, drowsy and loose-limbed with morphine.

Still, he notices the pinch to Merlin’s mouth, the way he chooses to sit, rather than stand. Eggsy twitches the fingers of his broken arm, reminded of what feels like a life before, where he’d assured a worried doctor he’d only hurt himself free running.

“Galahad.”

Time collapses again, months suddenly condensing until it feels like he’s standing in the rain again.

"They’re all dead,” he says uselessly, “You almost died.” For a long, unending moment, he had been dead.

He’s not sure, suddenly, that he’s cut out for this.

For strangling someone to death, for watching everyone he cares about die, come back only to struggle.

He’s horrified when his eyes start to burn, shifting away as if he can somehow hide.

“Eggsy—” he starts, but his name hangs there and nothing follows.

He looks at Merlin and he’s suddenly certain the exhaustion will choke them both.

He laughs, watery and awkward, scrubbing at his face with his working arm.

“Sorry, I — m’sorry. I’m a fuckin’ prick, aren’t I? Bangin’ on like this.” Merlin’s expression says no, but Eggsy shakes his head before the man can say another word, desperate not to feel worse than he already does. He feels cruel and small, selfish again.

For a long moment, neither of them say anything, unable to swallow down the bone-deep weariness.

“The mission, alright?” Merlin finally offers, quiet and almost subdued. 

       “ I was born in a thunderstorm, I grew up overnight.  I played alone,            I played on my own.  I survived. “

       Conversation about his family, about his childhood was generally not          well met, given the stance Kingsman had in regards to Rutherford          lending.  But he supposes the fact that it was brought up by Merlin          is what leads him to actually speaking about it in something close          to a pleasant tone.

[sips tea]

It’s not been as long as it feels, a notion at odds with the fact that every time he closes his eyes he still sees the easy, casual killings. They’d made the right call, killed people willing to let the rest of the world burn, and yet he can’t scrub it from his mind.

It feels like it’s been months, a handful of seconds, years, the blink of an eye.

It’s been one month and three days. Three and a half, actually.

He knows how many, though he wishes he didn’t.

He sees the number everywhere he goes.

He looks up when Merlin settles across from him, He pushes a cuppa across, not quite watching Eggsy, whose full attention is on Merlin.

“I can’t stop thinkin’ ‘bout it,” he says, hands wrapping around the mug like he’s cold. “It wasn’t wrong, but I ain’t felt right about it since.”

If Eggsy didn’t know better, he’d think the man almost looks fond.

The words lance through him, quick and clean. One more bullet in a gun Merlin’s been firing since Eggsy started.

Except the wound is old, and it hooks at something in him, tears at walls like a barb. 

He doesn’t know how to be anyone other than who he is, doesn’t know how to cut out that part of himself that was never fit for service in the first place. Not according to Kingsman standards. He’s done too much to be turned away, and yet round and round they go, the cycle never ending.

Eggsy will never be what is expected of him.

His shoulders sag under the weight of it, but he’s used to it — used to this. Becoming, being, a failure. His chin lifts the way it always does, the way it always will.

He will never be what is expected of him.

Maybe that’s what Kingsman needs.

He won’t kill because they point and say do this, he won’t remove himself. He’ll be attached, even if he’s the only one. Who else will care about them?

Who else will jump on the bomb, if not someone who is attached?

You did, he thinks, defiantly staring at the other man, you are, too.

He could have let Eggsy die. 

His arms hang at his sides, rebellion smoldering in him. Armed now with the knowledge that Merlin is a liar, that Merlin is— 

Somewhere beneath a life of service to Kingsman is a man who is just as attached.